Moments like what transpired on Saturday inside Fant-Ewing Coliseum don’t come around often at ULM.

This particular one was nine years in the making.

As the clock ticked down to under a minute and with a much-anticipated win over Georgia State secured, ULM men’s basketball coach Keith Richard called for the bench. The Warhawk reserves filed out one-by-one, each taking the place of a senior.

Majok Deng, Mack Foster, DeMondre Harvey, Justin Roberson and Jamaal Samuel all got their moment. It may have only been for a few seconds, but each of them soaked in the high fives from their teammates while the fans in attendance thanked them for an undefeated season at home with a standing ovation.

“It’s great looking back on everything we’ve done here the past two years,” Deng said. “I’m really happy that we’re leaving something behind at this school that people will remember and talk about for a long time.”

While it’s easy to minimize this season compared to what ULM accomplished in 2015, in a way this year was more important. It hit Richard in the final seconds against Georgia State (16-13, 9-11) as the Warhawks (19-12, 15-5) wrapped up a 91-78 win and the first back-to-back winning seasons since 1992-93 and 1993-94.

You can’t label Richard and the Warhawks a one-year wonder. Not after they’ve done it twice.

“This year was very important for us to not have that flash-in-the-pan deal,” Richard said. I said before the season I didn’t know how many games we’d win but I knew we had a good team.

“Really and truly, how you’re judged as a coach is on the consistency of your program. That’s what this season was about for us and I’m really proud of those guys.”

It would have been easy for ULM to coast through the final week of the regular season after securing the two seed in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament. Neither Richard or the locker room was going to let that happen, though.

ULM still had plenty to play for; a chance to stop the bleeding against a Georgia State team it had never beaten alongside a run at history.

“It was important for us to go out and just do what we do every day,” Roberson said. “Coach was telling us we’re the fifth team that did it. To go undefeated at home, that’s an amazing accomplishment.”

Richard spent the week telling the Warhawks to be the team that can handle success while keeping their attention on the next game.

ULM did that with two wins over Georgia Southern and Georgia State this week. Now the next game points the Warhawks to New Orleans’ Lakefront Arena in the Sun Belt tournament and a mystery opponent to be named on Friday.

“I wanted to make sure they knew that but this group has been good about that for the past two months,” Richard said.